Prudential plc

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This article is about the British company. For the American company, see Prudential Financial. For places named after the company, see Prudential.

Prudential plc

Type	Public (LSE: PRU, NYSE: PUK)
Founded	1848
Headquarters	London, England, UK
Key people	Sir David Clementi, Chairman Mark Tucker, CE
Industry	Financial services
Products	Financial services
Revenue	£32,866 million (2007)
Operating income	£1,185 million (2007)
Net income	£1,025 million (2007)
Employees	26,000^[1]
Website	www.prudential.co.uk

Prudential plc (LSE: PRU, NYSE: PUK) is a United Kingdom-based financial services company. The company has over 21 million customers worldwide^[1]. As well as the UK arm of its operations it has operations in 12 countries in Asia and owns Jackson National Life in the United States. It founded the Egg internet bank, which it sold to Citigroup in 2007.

Within the UK, the company's business includes the sale of pensions, annuities, savings and investments (bonds, ISAs). They are particularly well-known for the sale of with-profit bonds and pensions, corporate pension schemes, bulk annuities and individual annuities. The company left the general insurance (household, car) market in 2002, licensing Churchill Insurance (now part of the Royal Bank of Scotland group) to use the Prudential name.

1 Management
2 UK Insurance Operations
3 Overseas Operations
4 Prudential Assurance versus Prudential Financial
5 See also
6 References
7 External links

[edit] Management

There are currently 13 people on the board of directors. Key individuals are:

Chairman of Board of Directors	Sir David Clementi
Group Chief Executive	Mark Tucker
Group Finance Director	Philip Broadley
President & Chief Executive Officer for Jackson National Life	Clark Manning
Chief Executive of M&G	Michael McLintock
Chief Executive of Prudential Corporation Asia	Barry Stowe
Chief Executive of UK & European Insurance Operations	Nick Prettejohn

[edit] UK Insurance Operations

Holborn Bars - Traditional home of Prudential

Prudential plc was founded on 30 May 1848 in Hatton Garden, London, as The Prudential Mutual Assurance Investment and Loan Association. It began by providing loans to professionals secured through life assurance. The company became The Prudential Assurance Company in 1867 and a limited company in 1881 following the introduction of the Limited Liability Act 1880 and floated on the London Stock Exchange in 1924.

In 1858 they began selling the relatively new concept of industrial branch insurance policies to the working class population for premiums as low as one penny through agents acting as door to door salesmen. The firm built its early strength on this large direct sales force of agents who would visit clients in person to discuss their needs and to collect insurance premiums. The army of premium collection agents was for many many years identified with the Prudential as the "Man from the Pru". This was a successful policy for Prudential at the time and despite competition from more established assurance companies the Prudential insured about one-third of the UK population in the early 1900s.

Relative to the size of the UK economy and financial markets the firm became more influential than either Prudential Financial of America or Nissei (Nippon Life) in Japan. Today, Prudential is one of the top listed UK based life insurance companies with key businesses in the UK, US and Asia.

Prudential stayed focused on branch-based sales while the products shifted from traditional whole-of-life policies to group pensions and an increasing popularity of With Profits products. In recent years the Prudential has become concentrated in specialist areas, particularly With Profits and Annuities where it holds a significant market share. Its takeover of Scottish Amicable lead to a concentration in the Independent Financial Adviser (IFA) market and the reduction of the direct customer sales more attributed to the "man from the Pru" concept.

It restructured into a holding company called Prudential Corporation Plc in 1978 after the acquisition of Vanbrugh Life and M&G Reinsurance amongst others. On 1 October 1999 a name change resulted in Prudential plc for ease of recognition and overseas expansion. In June 2000 the company listed on the New York Stock Exchange to help focus on the US market.

In 1997 Scottish Amicable was acquired after demutualisation. It was originally the West of Scotland Life Insurance Company and was founded in Glasgow, Scotland in 1826.

In 1998 Prudential set up Egg, an internet bank within the UK. The subsidiary reached £5 billion in deposits and 500,000 customers within six months but did not reach profitability until the end of 2001. In June 2000 an initial public offering of 21% was made to allow for further growth of the company but a failed attempt to gain market share in France with the takeover of Zebank in 2002 led to a pull out in 2004 and a failed attempt by Prudential to sell the bank. In February 2006 Prudential repurchased the 21% share of Egg that it sold in 2000 to move the bank solely into its UK Insurance Operations business. Egg was subsequently sold to Citibank in January 2007.

In 2001, M&G, a UK fund management company, was acquired. Initially run as a standalone business unit, it was moved into the UK Insurance Operations business in late 2005. On 4 October 2004, Prudential launched a new subsidiary, PruHealth, a joint venture with Discovery Holdings of South Africa. PruHealth sells Private Medical Insurance to the UK market. The business currently employs 6,700 full-time staff in offices in Stirling, Reading, Belfast, London, Dublin and Mumbai^[2].

In April 2008, around 3000 jobs will transfer across to Capita under a TUPE agreement. These breakdown as 1000 in Stirling, 750 in Reading and 1250 in Mumbai.

[edit] Overseas Operations

In addition to the original UK business, Prudential plc has two other business units:

Prudential is the largest UK life assurer in Asia and operates through Prudential Corporation Asia. It has had a presence in the continent since 1923 when an overseas agency for life assurance was created in India. Although this was subsequently nationalised, Prudential has recently relaunched in India as ICICI Prudential, a 26% joint venture with ICICI Bank. As CITIC Prudential Life, a 50-50 joint venture, they were the first UK company to re-establish life business in China in 2000. As of August 2005 they have 10 city or provincial licences in China. There are also businesses in Hong Kong, Taiwan, Japan, South Korea, Singapore, Malaysia, Philippines, Thailand, Vietnam and Indonesia.

Jackson National Life was purchased in 1986. It was named after Andrew Jackson, the seventh President of the United States of America and started business in 1961 at Jackson, Michigan.

[edit] Prudential Assurance versus Prudential Financial

Prudential Assurance Company Ltd, now part of Prudential Plc, was for many years the dominant life assurance company in the UK.

It was agents from the Pru who, on deciding to leave Prudential and move to the United States, were given access to all the techniques of the firm to assist them in forming an insurance firm in America. That infant company went on to become Prudential of America, The Rock. There was never a significant ownership link between the two Prudential companies although there is a memorandum of understanding about use of the Prudential name around the world.